Piers Morgan has offered up his annual Premier League predictions on the eve of the season as the circus nears its 30th anniversary. 

The broadcaster and journalist, famously an Arsenal fan, has rather unsurprisingly tipped Manchester City to win the title, crediting Pep Guardiola with turning them into a Sir Alex Ferguson-like winning machine. Liverpool will once again fall short in second.

However, writing for The Sun, it is City's neighbours that are set to be the big disappointment with Morgan not seeing new boss Erik ten Hag as being capable enough of arresting the sharp decline that has marked the post-Ferguson years. 

Piers Morgan has predicted Manchester City to once again retain their Premier League crown

He wrote: 'The biggest bunch of overpaid, under-performing wastrels in Premier League history will have another terrible season.

'So much expensive talent but so little dedication, commitment or pride in wearing those world-famous shirts,' he added. 

'New manager Erik ten Hag talks a good game but his transfer business so far has been seriously underwhelming and he will quickly discover his showboating Twitter-obsessed prima donnas just don’t have the right mentality to compete.

'I doubt they will even make the top six.'   

The season kicks off on Friday night with Arsenal travelling to Crystal Palace and Morgan believes the Gunners will return to the top four after what would be seven years out of the Champions League spots. 

'I’m convinced North London’s rivals will prevail over rouble-deprived Chelsea and a Manchester United [for the final two top four slots] side so awful that Cristiano Ronaldo will take a pay cut to leave them,' he believes.

'It kills me to put Spurs above Arsenal. But I fear they have a stronger, smartly reinforced squad, the best strike force duo in Harry Kane and Son Heung-min, and in their magnificently volatile manager Antonio Conte, a natural-born winner who, unlike Mikel Arteta, will view coming third as a humiliating failure.'

Meanwhile, Morgan's most embarrassing moment of the season award has already been dished out with Arsenal's newly-released Amazon Prime documentary claiming the prize. 

He says of the fly-on-the-wall doc: 'Judging by the trailers, every second of Amazon’s upcoming All or Nothing series on Arsenal will be a cringe-making horror story.

'Arteta comes across as an even weirder, bossier Pep-lite rookie headmaster than I feared him to be, and knowing how badly the season ends, I’d honestly rather watch someone hammer rusty nails into my flesh than relive it all again.'

Ralph Hassenhuttl is the first manager to be sacked, with Morgan writing of the Austrian: 'I’m amazed he’s still there, given how pathetically the Saints ended last season and the fact he’s already hinting he’ll retire when his contract expires in 2024.'

Unsurprisingly, given his Hasenhuttl prediction, Morgan has Southampton to go down alongside newly promoted Fulham and Bournemouth.